1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an apparatus for turning up and down seats for a telescopic seating system and more particularly to an apparatus for automatically turning up and down spectator's seats for a telescopic seating system of the type including a plurality of movable platforms which are arranged in their wherein they are displaced forwardly in the jointed state one after another when the telescopic seating system is in use and they are displaced backwardly in the reverse manner when it is not in use.
2. Description of the Prior Art
In recent years a telescopic seating system including a plurality of movable platforms arranged in tier is increasingly employed for a building such as gymnasium or the like in order to utilize the floor space more effectively by fully accommodating all the movable platforms in a cavity formed on the one side wall structure of the building when the system is not in use. The movable platforms employable for the telescopic seating system are arranged in the form of a so-called doll tier stand in such a manner that the foremost movable platform is located at the lowermost position and the rearmost movable platform is located at the highest position when the system is in use while all the movable platforms assume their extended position. They are operatively connected to one another and they can assume the extended position in the doll tier stage-shaped configuration by starting forward movement with the lowermost movable platform. After all the movable platforms assume the extended position, the seats are raised up so as to allow spectators to seat on them. On the other hand, when utilization of the system is completed, they are successively accommodated in the cavity of the building without any projection outwardly of the wall surface by starting rearward movement in the reverse manner with the lowermost movable platform.
However, the conventional telescopic seating system as constructed in the above-mentioned manner has the following problems.
Namely, in the conventional telescopic seating system it is necessary that all the seats are manually turned up one by one by personnels employed by the building after all the movable platforms assume their extended position to utilize the system. Moreover, after completion of utilization of the system they should be manually turned down one by one by them before the movable platforms are accommodated in the cavity of the building. Accordingly, a large number of man-hours are required for manually turning up and down a number of seats at every time before utilization of the system and after completion of utilization of the same, resulting in the system being operated at an increased cost. Thus, the gymnasium or the like building in which the system is installed is used at a reduced economical efficiency.
To obviate the foregoing problems there was already made a proposal for the conventional telescopic seating system as disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,155,202. This proposed telescopic seating system is so constructed that all components constituting a seat are automatically folded and unfolded without any necessity for manual handling to be performed by personnels employed by the building. However, it has been pointed out that the proposed telescopic seating system has still drawbacks that it is complicated in structure and therefore it can be installed at an expensive cost.